-
- News
- Books
Featured Books
- smt007 Magazine
Latest Issues
Current IssueIPC APEX EXPO 2024 Pre-show
This month’s issue devotes its pages to a comprehensive preview of the IPC APEX EXPO 2024 event. Whether your role is technical or business, if you're new-to-the-industry or seasoned veteran, you'll find value throughout this program.
Boost Your Sales
Every part of your business can be evaluated as a process, including your sales funnel. Optimizing your selling process requires a coordinated effort between marketing and sales. In this issue, industry experts in marketing and sales offer their best advice on how to boost your sales efforts.
The Cost of Rework
In this issue, we investigate rework's current state of the art. What are the root causes and how are they resolved? What is the financial impact of rework, and is it possible to eliminate it entirely without sacrificing your yields?
- Articles
- Columns
Search Console
- Links
- Events
||| MENU - smt007 Magazine
Is Configure to Order Manufacturing the Right Strategy for Me?
June 30, 2017 | Danielle Olivier, JJS ManufacturingEstimated reading time: 7 minutes
Arguably, industrial electronics is once again falling victim to the consumer electronics market: the increase in personalization and customizable interfaces in consumer electronics is gradually forcing industrial electronics manufacturers to offer a similar service.
So where does this leave original equipment manufacturers (OEMs)? It gives them the opportunity to stay ahead of their market and adapt their own manufacturing strategy before the competition catch on. One such option, known as Configure to Order (CTO) manufacturing, or Postponement, allows OEMs to respond dynamically to unknown or changing customer demand.
In this article, we’ll look at what we mean by the term CTO, the importance of supply chain management, where responsibilities lie when setting up new agreements with an electronics manufacturing services (EMS) provider and some of the benefits OEMs can expect to see.
What is Configure to Order manufacturing?
CTO manufacturing involves an EMS provider putting in place a dedicated production line for your product, allowing you to 'call off' configured and tested units when you need them, with a reduced lead-time.
The process typically begins by manufacturing enough ‘base’ (or embryo) units, which are then put into stock until a customer order is received for the top-level variant. Once this demand is sent through, the correct quantity of embryos is taken from stock and configured to the specification desired by the end customer. This is particularly effective when the OEM offers a wide range of product variants but can’t easily predict which ‘flavor’ will be required at any given time.
I always like to use the ice-cream analogy.
Before setting off on its daily round, the van will be stocked with cones, ice-cream and a range of different toppings. Unfortunately, it’s only after they start playing their musical jingle that they find out whether their customers want chocolate sauce, strawberry sauce, sprinkles, a flake or a combination of all four. There’s no way they can accurately predict exactly what their customers will want until they turn up at the side of their van.
Yes, they might be able to look back at the last few weeks and months to see what toppings are more popular than others but that’s as far as they can go. And you can almost guarantee that if they decide to stop stocking a ‘slow moving’ topping, their next set of customers will want to order it. Sound familiar?
The skill therefore is creating a stable supply chain which is flexible enough to cater for all possible combinations, at a moment’s notice, but without investing in more stock than is really needed.
Alignment with your EMS provider
When setting up a CTO agreement with your EMS partner there are some aspects that need to be aligned prior to the first build in order to ensure all parties’ needs are catered for and Service Level Agreements (SLAs) can be an effective way of achieving this.
Setting up a successful SLA that has both parties’ best interests in mind can help resolve a range of production pressures. The main aim of the SLA is to ensure that each party is contractually bound to uphold their commitments.
Of course, each SLA will need to be specific to each product and would typically include details such as price, quantity, build and delivery timescales along with time frames for order placement and product turnaround.
SLAs can reduce the time and admin associated with order placement as you only need to raise firm orders for the configured and tested units as and when the end user needs them – the ‘embryo’ units and all of the material and labor associated with these would not need to be ordered separately. Instead, the value relating to this stock would be included within the SLA which you would commit to on an annual basis when you sign up. It’s worth noting that running an SLA with any supplier needs close management.
It's much easier to see what stock you are committed to when you can see firm orders in place, so when there aren’t any, you still need a mechanism in place internally to make sure that the value you have signed up to behind the scenes is visible somehow.
In addition to confirming order quantities and stock liabilities, SLAs also serve as a commitment of expectations in regards to key performance indicators (KPIs) for both the OEM and EMS provider.
Data verification
Of course, nobody knows your product better than you. Therefore, it is important that all of your valuable product knowledge is transferred across to your EMS partner. This is vital in ensuring that your chosen assembly partner can manufacture your product to the same specifications that you have come to expect.
However, over time, it's recognized that varying degrees of 'local knowledge' can build up on the shop floor which don't always make it back to the relevant department or build pack. So prior to any outsourcing project, regardless of whether it will be run with CTO in mind, we recommend that an internal audit of your own data packs take place in conjunction with your production staff to ensure everything is captured. If the materials being used out on the line, or the technique carried out at test differs in any way from the set of instructions you're about to hand over to your EMS provider, chances are they will replicate your 'current state', which may not meet your expectations.
Supply chain management
As we have already touched on, implementing a successful CTO manufacturing strategy is reliant on a comprehensive and established supply chain being firmly in place. Without one, assembly times can increase, material pricing can go up and product quality can be compromised. Partnering with an EMS provider that has established and reliable supply chain relationships already in place helps relieve these pressures and gives considerable reassurance that your product will be manufactured with minimal delay and with cost effective quality parts.
Managing supply chains takes place in a variety of ways and each outsourcing partner and the relationships they hold with their material suppliers will differ. Some EMS providers will create Letters of Intent (LOIs) for key items to help minimize both risk and production delays on CTO projects. These act as a forecast between the EMS and their suppliers for the material parts required in build and the estimated annual usage and unit pricing is agreed at the start of the contract. Any parts with extended lead times will usually be 'buffered' so that they can be delivered into the EMS provider, often next day, and certainly well in advance of their standard lead-time.
Ensuring the right parts are delivered at the right time to the right place is a constant juggling act. Implementing a CTO strategy usually requires a significant upfront investment in stock by the EMS provider. Therefore, any changes to material supply, for example the result of a product re-design or part change, must be communicated efficiently to them in order to minimize the amount of potentially redundant stock they have in the pipeline at any one time.
Page 1 of 2
Suggested Items
NextFlex Announces 2024 Fellows Awards for Five Outstanding Recipients
03/29/2024 | BUSINESS WIRENextFlex, America's Hybrid Electronics Manufacturing Institute, presented the annual NextFlex Fellow Awards to five deserving individuals in recognition of their exceptional commitment to advanced manufacturing and the additive hybrid electronics member community.
NEOTech Promotes Emilio Ramirez to Chief Technology Officer
03/29/2024 | NEOTechNEOTech, a leading provider of electronic manufacturing services (EMS), design engineering, and supply chain solutions in the high-tech industrial, medical device, and aerospace/defense markets, is thrilled to announce the promotion of Emilio Ramirez to the position of Chief Technology Officer (CTO).
MKS’ Atotech, ESI to Participate in IPC APEX EXPO
03/29/2024 | MKS’ AtotechMKS’ Atotech and ESI will participate in this year’s IPC APEX EXPO 2024, the PCB industry’s largest event in North America, to be held in Anaheim, California, to be held from April 6-11 2024 at the Anaheim California Convention Center.
Cogiscan Collaborates with Koh Young to Unveil How Factory Insights Software Transforms Data Into Action at IPC APEX EXPO
03/28/2024 | Koh YoungKoh Young, the industry leader in True3D measurement-based inspection solutions, is excited to announce Factory Insights, the latest offering from Cogiscan, will be demonstrated alongside KSMART in Koh Young booth 2112 during IPC APEX Expo.
ASMC 2024 to Showcase AI, Smart Manufacturing and Sustainability to Advance Chip Industry Manufacturing Expertise
03/27/2024 | SEMIMore than 125 experts will offer insights into the latest semiconductor manufacturing strategies and methodologies as hundreds of industry stakeholders gather at the 35th annual SEMI Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC 2024), May 13-16 in Albany, New York.